Vitriolic Friends
by Thunderscourge
Summary: It's just another prosaic, run-of-the-mill, days at Mann Co. where the infamous mercenaries of the Blu team must face off against the hordes of Grey Mann. Unfortunately for the Blu team however, Scout is as vocal as ever and makes his presence known to all: friend and foe alike. Slight Scout X Miss Pauling, mainly on Scout's side Heavy, Sniper, Soldier and Medic included too!


A/N: This is my first Team Fortress 2 story, so please forgive me for whatever sins may lie within!

Slight Scout X Miss Pauling, as suggested in the canon comic sources from Valve

* * *

"Bam, home run!"

"Nice catch there, with your face!"

"Can't touch this, na-na-na-na."

"I call this one the nutcracker!"

The mercenary designated 'Scout' was not known for restraining himself, be it his voice or his behavior. Even his own teammates were sure the young man never shut up, and it took every ounce of self restraint of the Blu team he belonged to not to kill him in his sleep each night. Not only did he tend to snore loudly, befitting of the his nature, the paid-psychopaths constantly had to listen to his inane chatter during all hours, including battle.

"...Wait, do robots even have nuts? Oh well, doesn't matter, the piece of junk is still in pieces."

The Scout was also not known for being the most bright member of the team. While far from stupid, he did not have the Ph.D in Russian Literature his teammate the 'Heavy' had nor the medical training of the 'Medic' (even if said medical man's licence was revoked), his mental potential seemed to not be realized...his intelligence was all in what one would call 'street smarts'.

"Scout, please quiet the commentary. We don't need a play-by-play."

The young, lithe baseball loving member of the Blue team of mercenaries felt his heart flutter at the sound of that voice. Ever since Grey Mann had started his robotic invasion of the land that formerly belonged to his brothers (the former owners of the mercenary teams), Scout had less time to spend looking for single women and that left one woman his age that he could youthfully lust after.

Ducking behind a large boulder and taking cover besides his teammate known solely as the Heavy weapons guy, Scout spoke into the headset he often wore into battle with a gleeful voice, while also completely ignoring the battle surrounding him at the moment,"Miss Pauling? When did you get here, babe? I thought that old kook was looking after us?"

One of the many people who oversaw the operations of the Red and Blu team, along with the infamous Administrator and the testosterone fueled Saxton Hale, Miss Pauling had had many encounters with the members of each squad. More precisely, the woman could swear ninety percent were with this one man, the other seventeen leaving her be for the most part.

Knowing that if she talked too long that she risked being hit on, Miss Pauling decided to explain the situation and get him off of the comm system, "The Administrator is currently handling a situation with the Red team. Apparently they forgot that they were supposed to destroy a tank and are panicking."

Turning to face the large man beside him, Scout scoffed at the mention of their partner team, "Hah, those morons don't know nothing, am I right big guy?"

Heavy frowned down at Scout, his bald face not at all showing signs of amusement as Scout may have wished, "Small rabbit should not be speaking. Forgot to gather money. Money that Heavy would be sending to family."

Scout pointed his not baseball bat wielding hand's index finger at his much larger teammate, "Hey, when you're kicking as much metal aft as I am, you're bound to forget something. But you wouldn't know what that's like, would ya mister bear?"

"If tin men not fighting us now, I-"

Over the intercom came Miss Pauling's voice once more, interrupting the Heavy's threat, "Excuse me, but could you focus on your objectives? There are enemy spies on the way and I don't intend to tell the Administrator you all failed under my watch."

Seeing an opportunity to show the lovely Miss Pauling his mettle, Scout pumped a fist in the air and yelled, "Sure thing! Anything for you miss Pauling!"

Rolling his eyes, Heavy left their cover to look for one of the pesky spy robots that enjoyed stabbing him in the back at any given opportunity. Upon leaving the cover, he was met with something unexpected: two mirror images of himself. The large Russian man grabbed one of the fake Heavy's by the neck and tossed it to the ground, quickly stomping a large foot down on it to finish the job.

Standing beside the real Heavy was Scout, chuckling at the display. The remaining spybot knew that confronting the Heavy _as_ the Heavy would be illogical, so it transformed into a replica of the Blu soldier instead. Upon seeing this shift the Scout laughed again, pointing to himself as he spoke to the robot, "Ooh, ooh, do me, do me!"

Confused, the spy robot stopped in its tracks and faced the Blu Scout. After a moment the spy realized what the Scout was asking for, and the robot obliged the request of becoming a pseudo-Scout, pulling out a knife to stab the real Scout with simultaneously.

Dodging the robot's first knife swing, Scout grabbed the offending knife hand and pulled the weapon away, "Let me tell ya bot, I've seen better. Even that creep who my mom hangs out with can impersonate me better!" Looking to the side, where a large Russian man had finished curb stomping an enemy spy, Scout nodded towards the robot whose hand he held, "Let-er rip Heavy!"

The Russian took no time to hesitate, taking out his precious gun 'Sasha' and pointing it at the chest of the robot. Scout jumped back right as the Heavy's prized minigun tore the machine apart, laughing and having the time of his life as he did so, "You guys got bolts for brains, ya know that?"

The sound of a sniper rifle nearby shook the Scout to the bone, scaring the street smart man because of how close the shot had been to hitting him. And worst of all? He knew the robots didn't have snipers with them, but his team sure had a sniper. Before calling out his sniper for being a team killing fat-tard, Scout caught sight of what had been shot: a spy robot that had been sneaking up on him. And next to it? A Blu sniper.

Knowing that Grundy, the team's sniper, would not have taken a shot that close to an enemy while he still had a kukri at his side, Scout shook his head as he pulled out his baseball bat, "Oh boy, you stupid bots don't know who you're messing with, do you?"

"Scout, please focus-"

Scout cut off the voice of miss Pauling form the intercom as he took a swing with his bat at the spy's head, "This is me focusing. I can multitask like a pro!" as the bat cleaved the head off the robot he gave a loud laugh, "See? Talked to you and beat a metal head in at the same time. Sniper isn't the only one who can do headshots!"

A loud sigh could be heard over the intercom, but the disgruntled miss Pauling fell on deaf ears...at least, Scout didn't acknowledge her dislike of his talkativeness and he was the only one who mattered. Why was it that he was the _only_ one with a headset? She could think of a few reasons, and most of them had to do with herself to her dislike.

The spybots having all been taken care of, Scout decided to move onto the other robots running around in the area. This time around there was a plethora of Scout bots running around, reminiscent of the one true blue Scout, and he was not pleased by this.

One swing was followed by another of the baseball bat from Boston, swathing a path through the Grey Mann machines as he taunted, "Take that, and that! You knock offs got nuttin' on me!" Another swing knocked one Scout bot into two others, knocking them off their feet as well, "Bam! Order in the next ten minutes and get a free beating, just pay shipping and handling."

Nearby, the Heavy was being swarmed by small and nimble Scout bots. A swing of his massive weapon, while still being fired, cleared them away but their metal bats had already done their damage and the large Russian yelled, "Medic!"

"I am here!" came the German accented response, the team's sociopathic doctor running across the battlefield to join his common battle buddy, Heavy, and fix his wounds up.

On his way to Heavy, Medic fired his syringe gun at some nearby Scout bots, somehow taking the robots offline. Upon seeing this the Scout scoffed, not understanding how the team's doctor could get away with such a ridiculous weapon, "Hey Doc, have ya thought of maybe using a gun that, I dunno, shoots bullets and not medicine?"

Having reached the Heavy, Medic ignored Scout and began repairing the large man's wounds. With a small 'hmmph', Scout looked for a new robot to beat up, "Fine, ignore me. I got better things to be doing, you crazy bat," Seeing a new target, Scout leapt towards them with a childish glee, "Take this you metal freak!"

"Mhhmhhhhhmmmm!"

Right before reaching the target, Scout put a brake on his advance, his face turning into absolute terror, muttering, "Oh crap! Backing up, backing up!" as he did just that.

It was the team's pyromaniac's turn to play.

A swing of a fire axe tore apart three Scout bots easily, quickly followed up with a continuous burst of flame from the insane Pyro's flamethrower. The flames surged forward and engulfed a half dozen other Scouts, a turn of Pyro's wrists now making it so five more Scouts were wreathed in flames.

Enemy machines melting and crumbling around him/it/her, the Pyro lifted its flamethrower above its head and let out a, "Mhhhmm! Hmmoohooohohoho!"

Shuddering at the sight of such massive and brutal destruction, Scout spoke into his mic to address Miss Pauling, "I think Pyro's got things covered here. How are things on your end, toots?"

Partially glad someone was willing to listen to her and partially annoyed at who it was, Miss Pauling responded, "An enemy scout is on its way to the base and your teammates are too wrapped up to notice me yelling at them. Would you take care of this?"

Jumping right into action, the Blue Scout ran in the direction of where every Mann robot wanted to go: the area's main base where a well placed bomb could blow the whole area sky high. Pushing the mic to his mouth, Scout let out an affirmative, "Right on it!" and sprinted as fast as his legs would carry him towards the area.

Quickly catching sight of the enemy Miss Pauling mentioned, Scout chased after it as fast as his legs would carry. Luckily for him, no Mann produced robot could hope to compete with him in a footrace and he soon overcame it, simultaneously sweeping its legs from under it with his trusty baseball bat, "One Scout, in 30 seconds or it's free!"

The robot struggled to get upright, the large bomb strapped to its back weighing it down, but when it managed to get onto it's two legs it was faced with a problem: a bat to the face in fact, with a taunt following it up, "Hey buddy, whatcha think you're doing?"

The Mann machine let out a scream of robotic agony, one of its legs having been damaged by the Blu Scout's swing. However, despite its injury, the robot Scout refused to give in and its programming drove it to crawl forward towards the very nearby target it had been deployed to destroy: the Mann Co base. Seeing its determination to finish the job, the human Scout frowned brought his bat back to swing, "Oh no you don't!"

A powerful swing knocking the robot's head twenty feet away from the rest of its body later, Scout wiped his now sweaty brow, "Whew, that was a close call, am I right guys?"

From the nearby base exited the dim witted and very insane man known simply as 'Soldier', a man who while usually friendly did not enjoy small chit chat on the battlefield, "Private, do you ever close that mouth of yours?"

"What's it to you, buckethead?"

The volatile Soldier withdrew his trusty melee weapon, a shovel, and pointed it at Scout, "Why I oughta-"

For the good of Scout, Miss Pauling felt that it was once more time to intervene, "Mercenaries, pay attention! There is a giant heavy on its way and I don't want your in-fighting to ruin this operation."

With a childish chuckle, Scout spoke into his mic, "You got it Miss Pauling!"

With a glance around the battlefield, Scout's eyes caught something of interest: the giant Heavy that was now slowly advancing and pinning down Soldier had seemingly passed right by their own Heavy without noticing the bear of a man. Gears began to turn in Scout's mind about how to accomplish their new objective with this info, and soon his legs were running once more.

The giant heavy took notice to the quick and agile Scout heading his way, but the slow behemoth could not turn it's weapon on the young man before the baseball enthusiast slipped right on through the metal giant's legs. Now, having gained the robot's attention, Scout ran in a completely new direction, making the slow turning robot constantly move to fire at its newly acquired target. While doing this the Blu Scout yelled out to the hiding and wounded Blu Heavy, whacking his baseball bat at the robot Heavy's legs as he did so, "Hey, Heavy, you listening, fatty?"

The giant man grunted in pain as he responded, "Unwillingly."

Scout cackled to himself. This was it, the killing blow.

"This big robot is the one who touched Sasha the other day!"

There were many things that could set off the ticking time bomb known as the Heavy. Eating his sandwich without permission, hurting his team, injuring the medic in the slightest capacity, and worst of all, damaging or even just plain touching his beloved minigun, Sasha. Now, once a berserk button of the giant Heavy weapons man was pushed all kinds of logic left the area for him. Sure, the robot didn't _really_ touch his gun, but bringing up such a thing nullified all logic as it was.

Leaping from cover, the Blu team's large Russian squadmate revved up his beloved minigun and yelled loudly, "Metal giant is dead man!"

The giant robot Heavy did not hear this yell in time, for its focus was solely on the Blu Scout and by the time it realized what the Heavy was yelling the Robot's chest already had five hundred rounds in it. Another thousand tore through the same abdomen before it could even turn to face the Heavy, and the robot burst into flames before it could even try to return fire.

A quick jump away from the exploding machine and Scout found himself amongst bundles and bundles of cash. For some reason the creator of these machines, Mann, thought that making them run on money made sense, but Scout was not about to complain. Pocketing wads and wads of cash, Scout simultaneously wiped some dirt off his shoulder while speaking into his comm system, "Well, I think we're done here. Any more bots to kill, Miss Pauling?"

The normally stoic Miss Pauling replied in a slightly warm voice, the recent win relieving some of the tension she felt, "They appear to be retreating. Remain alert for the time being until they have left completely."

The sight of Scout's eight other teammates approaching him made the youthful man give a more compact reply than he would have given otherwise, "Got it Babe."

The first to reach Scout, and the hordes of money surrounding him, was the Sniper and ol' Mundy did not look pleased. A push on the shoulder signaled to Scout just that message, "Boy, what's the bloody matter with ya?"

Scout frowned at the older man, "What are you talking about? What did I do this time?"

The response he received was spoken in part annoyance and part concern, Mundy being a professional and all, "You got in the way of half my darn shots today. Do you want me to hit ya by accident?"

Scout gave a playful nudge against the man's chest, "If _you_ hit me I am sure it won't be by accident, pal. And besides, think of it this way, you got all this extra ammo left today to use tomorrow! Win-win, right?"

"Just watch it boy, or els-get down!" Halfway through his berating of Scout the Sniper grabbed the boy and yanked him forward, something having caught his eye behind the Scout and as if to prove him right a blade sliced through the air where the Blu Scout had been.

The source of the blade swipe was none other than a Blu Scout, but the Sniper knew better than that. Tossing Scout to the floor, Mundy opened fire on the fake Scout holding the knife with his SMG. The fragile robot tore to pieces under the rapid gun fire, but a shimmer in the area revealed the presence of another Spy to the Sniper. Having run out of ammo in his clip, Mundy unsheathed his kukri knife and sliced forward, catching the spy robot in the gut and eviscerating it. The robot fell to the floor next to it's similarly destroyed brother while the Sniper instead let out a breath of relief, not seeing any more shimmers.

The Sniper extended a hand to Scout, who was a little stunned over what just happened, and helped pull the boy up, "There, I think that's the last of them buggers."

While still a wisecracking jerk, the Scout was not above gratitude, "Thanks for the save, man. That jerk almost got me! How'd you know there was a spy?"

Mundy sneered as Scout stood up fully, "I was already talking to one young brat, another trying to stab him in the back is awfully suspicious."

"If I wasn't still glad you saved my behind I would hit you with my bat for calling me a brat."

"Boy, I would like to see you try. My Bushwacka would have something to say about that there proposition."

Now the Heavy joined them alongside the Medic, the large Russian man commenting on the Sniper v Scout scene, "Does team ever be quiet?"

Scout turned away from Sniper and jabbed a finger at the Heavy, "No, we don't ever 'be quiet' fatty, cuz we always have to talk over your constant, loud, sandwich eating."

The Heavy shot his smaller companion a death glare, Sniper instead sighing and placing an arm around the Scout and imparting some wisdom, "Boy, you really could be a little nicer to everyone. I mean, it's not like we have to fight hordes of robots every day back-to-back and constantly save eachother's lives."

The Scout rolled his eyes, "Fine, I get it. What are you, my mother?"

Now joining the crowd was the Blu Spy, letting out a smug grin as he added to the conversation, "Speaking of your mother, the Red Spy sends her regards."

Not pleased that his mother was in a romantic relationship with the Red Spy of all people, Scout obviously reacted harshly to this statement, "Why that back-stabbin', good fer nothing-!"

The Heavy noticed a chance to rib the Scout for once and took it, "So, when vill Red Spy be Scout's new daddy?"

"Watch it big man! I have a bat and know how to use it!"

"Oh really tiny rabbit? Big man vish to see vat it is puny arms can do-"

"Ahem."

The clearing of a throat made all the gathered mercenaries turn to face its source, that source being none other than the purple clad Miss Pauling. Scout's eyes filled with hearts at the sight of her while the others regarded her with either indifference (Sniper, Medic) or slight contempt (Heavy, Spy). Now that she had their attention at least, the woman spoke as she pulled some envelopes out of her bag, "So Scout isn't killed, I will say this now: here is today's checks."

Not unhappy at this news but instead confused by it, Scout rushed over to her (a bit too close in her perspective) and asked, "Woah, we're getting paid this time? I thought we didn't have jobs anymore and were just fighting for the money we find in those robots?"

Miss Pauling sighed, beginning to regret this favor she was doing, "That is how Hale and the Administrator wish things to be, however I see no problem in letting you all keep the money you would have gotten as bonuses anyways if Scout had been doing his job correctly."

"Wait, so an extra eight hundred is in it for us all? Sa-weeet!" Gracefully taking an envelope marked 'Scout' from her hands, said youngster wrapped the Administrator's assistant in a bear hug, "Love ya Babe!"

The Blu team gave various signs of amusement and various signs of exasperation at the Scout's display of affection (Sniper grinning while shaking his head about how unprofessional it was, Medic chuckling at how he may have new test subjects in the future, Heavy ignoring it mostly, and Spy grunting at it), while Miss Pauling reacted to it simply with, "I'm taking half of yours."

"Worth it," Scout replied cheekily, releasing Miss Pauling and letting out a loud, "Woohoo! I can send somethin' home to ma for once! Thanks again Miss Pauling!"


End file.
